Three Cherries

Perishable;

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There's a long history of record labels being identified with a certain
sound. In jazz, Blue Note was known for the funky hard-bop of Art Blakey
and Horace Silver, while Impulse! cultivated a roster of avant-garde
explorers like John and Alice Coltrane and Archie Shepp. In the indie
rock universe, those who buy something on K or Kill Rock Stars can usually
depend on hearing some amateurish post-punk, while Kranky remains the
home of ambient dreamers. But Perishable, the label begun initially to
release Red Red Meat's debut album, is developing two identities: a
clearing house for the rhythm experiments of the Chicago instrumental
scene (Him, Drumhead, Out in Worship) and the keepers of the pawnshop
folk-blues flame, as previously burned by oRSo, Loftus, and now Sin
Ropas.

That Sin Ropas sounds like a Red Red Meat side project-- complete with
outdated drone machines, banjos, acoustic guitars and abrasive
percussion-- is no surprise: it's essentially the work of RRM's Tim
Hurley. Hurley has always been the second songwriter in Red Red Meat.
He contributed "Airstream Driver" to There's a Star Above the Manger
Tonight, and sang a couple of songs on the Loftus record. And he's
always been more about mood than melody. Indeed, while few of these
compositions would hold up well if separated from the complicated
production that characterizes the work of this collective, they still
hit with all the impact of a shovel to the face, due to a Hurley's talent
for instrumental nuance and shading.

Hurley's grizzled voice (which bears a passing resemblance to an
exhausted Neil Young) lacks depth of expression, but holds a certain
downcast sincerity that suits these songs well. And in the end, this
album seems to be about the finished recording, anyway-- you won't be
humming the tune to "Snakes in Shoes," but you'll remember the bouncy
slap of the snare drum.

A few of these tracks are instrumental, including the almost Calexico-like
"I Found Your Teeth." It combines wonderfully controlled guitar feedback,
melodica and upright bass to conjure a vivid scene of some booze-ravaged
hero prowling the warehouses down by the wharf, in search of a beautiful
woman best forgotten. From the tender metallic drone of "You'll Take the
Knife Out" to the spacy, down-the-hole weirdness of "Rabbit Dream," this
is cinematic music with force, and a worthy addition to Perishable's strong
catalog.